This chapter traces the career of Philipp Lenard, a prominent scientific figure in Nazi Germany, as a way of understanding some of the specifically German conceptions of the ether in the twentieth century. Starting from the perspective of Anglo-Saxon observers, the chapter sketches the development of Lenard’s understanding of the ether through his experience with the ether, the experiments he envisaged to prove the ether, and his emotions concerning the ether, as these impacted his scientific, philosophical and political approaches. The chapter also discusses his major scientific and popular writings from between 1910 and 1943, highlighting the exchange of ideas about the ether, particularly between German and British scientists, and delineating Lenard’s aims in the natural sciences as well as in political matters related to ether, matter, life and spirit, which became a central part of his Deutsche Physik, an infamous physics textbook from 1936.
WILHELM ORTHMANN/HANS GÖRGES/PHILIPP LENARD/NACH FRANKREICH/NACH DER SCHWEIZ
